With one in every 122 human beings a refugee, internally
displaced or seeking asylum United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon is
marking World Refugee Day by calling urgently on “governments and societies
around the world to recommit to providing refuge and safety to those who have
lost everything to conflict or persecution.”
Near the Boyabu Refugee Camp refugees buy cassava, a favorite staple in the region. |
Meanwhile, the Office of the UN High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR) has launched a social media campaign urging people to get
involved on the Day, marked annually on 20 June, to introduce individual
refugees such a Syrian saxophonist in Thailand to an Afghan architect in Greece
to give a face to the millions of families who have fled their homes to escape
war or human rights abuses.
In his message on the Day, the Secretary-general noted that
at the end of 2014, 59.5 million persons, the highest number on record, were
forcibly displaced around the globe.
“The ongoing conflict in Syria, as well as crises in Iraq,
Ukraine, South Sudan, Central African Republic, north-eastern Nigeria and parts
of Pakistan, have led to a staggering growth and acceleration of global forced
displacement,” he said.
“In 2014, 42,500 people became refugees, asylum seekers or
internally displaced every single day, a rate that has quadrupled in only four
years,” he said. “At the same time, many long-standing conflicts remained
unresolved and the number of refugees who were able to return home last year
was the lowest in over three decades.”
Mr Ban Ki-moon |
The UN chief reminded the world that many of those displaced
have had “no choice but to try and reach safety using dangerous means, such as
has been demonstrated by the sharp increase in irregular boat movements in the
Mediterranean, South-East Asia and elsewhere. “
“At times like these, it is essential that Governments and
societies around the world recommit to providing refuge and safety to those who
have lost everything to conflict or persecution,” he said.
Saying “refugees are people like anyone else, like you and
me,” Mr. Ban said, “on this World Refugee Day, let us recall our common
humanity, celebrate tolerance and diversity and open our hearts to refugees
everywhere.”
According to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for
Refugees (UNHCR), Syria is the world's biggest producer of both internally
displaced people (7.6 million) and refugees (3.88 million at the end of 2014).
Afghanistan (2.59 million) and Somalia (1.1 million) are the next biggest
refugee source countries.
Ahead of the Day, UNHCR released its latest Global Trends:World at War, which revealed that one in every 122 humans is now either a
refugee, internally displaced, or seeking asylum. If this were the population
of a country, says UNHCR, it would be the world's 24th largest.
“We are witnessing a paradigm change, an unchecked slide
into an era in which the scale of global forced displacement as well as the
response required is now clearly dwarfing anything seen before,” UN High
Commissioner for Refugees António Guterres declared in a press release issued
Thursday on the report's release.
“It is terrifying that on the one hand there is more and
more impunity for those starting conflicts, and on the other there is seeming
utter inability of the international community to work together to stop wars
and build and preserve peace,” he added.
“With huge shortages of funding and wide gaps in the global
regime for protecting victims of war, people in need of compassion, aid and
refuge are being abandoned,” Mr. Guterres continued.
“For an age of unprecedented mass displacement, we need an
unprecedented humanitarian response and a renewed global commitment to
tolerance and protection for people fleeing conflict and persecution.”
SOURCE UNHCR Press Release